Google launches new virtual world to rival Second Life

Google has launched the beta version of a new virtual world-based social network, to be called Lively.

Google has launched the beta version of a new virtual world-based social network, to be called Lively.

Cnet reports that Lively users will be able to build their own avatars – a kind of digital self – and interact with others just like the most established virtual world, Second Life.

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Users will also be able to construct their own virtual spaces, from rooms to desert islands, into which they will be able to pipe content from anywhere on the internet.

There are some differences to Second Life, however – Lively doesn’t have money and it’s not programmable, so users can only select things like furniture, clothes and hairstyles from the catalog Google supplies.

To access Lively, users must download software, but after that they can use Internet Explorer or Firefox to enter the virtual world.

“The Lively team wants to help people experience another dimension of the web. We hope you will use the product to express yourself with and without words, and to do this in the places you already visit on the web,” Google engineering manager Niniane Wang said on the official Google blog.